Dido’s Electronic-Folk Goes in Search of Depth

In the late ‘90s, singer-songwriters with an artsy streak who once might have been content to mimic folk heroes such as Joni Mitchell and Rickie Lee Jones look increasingly to the underground for inspiration, embroidering their otherwise demure sounds with the percussive scratches of a deejay and sampled drum loops.

English singer Dido is the latest performer to give this folk-hop amalgam a shot. At the Troubadour on Wednesday, the 26-year-old Englishwoman conjured up pastoral love songs with the abrasive jolt of electronic music. Dido’s vocals ring with the prim clarity of Sarah McLachlan and a hint of Sinead O’Connor’s Celtic melancholy, which gives emotional heft to even her most lightweight material.

At the Troubadour, Dido worked with a B-boy hipster quintet that toned down the wide-screen arrangements of her debut album, “No Angel.” Which was for the best, since Dido’s thin voice didn’t project with any power. Nor did her songs, which leaned heavily on shopworn romantic sentiment. Dido lured the audience in, but there was little of interest to explore once they were there.

Opener Kendall Payne is more of a folk-rock traditionalist. Wielding an acoustic guitar, she reeled off a few spunky love songs from her debut album, “Jordan’s Sister,” that followed a familiar template: swelling harmonies, vigorously strummed melodies and quirky, self-deprecating lyrics that mapped out the sexual battleground between men and women.